Beatrice Del Negro
November 13, 2018
Ozu’s “Floating Weeds” is set in a small Japanese fishing village where a troupe of traveling Kabuki players have come to perform. Their leader, however, has alternate intentions. He seeks to reconnect with his son whom he fathered with a mistress years earlier. When his current consort and the star of the troupe finds out, she explodes. Her rage and subsequent schemes threaten to collapse the carefully ordered world of family, neighborhood and town. Through the use of action, framing, transition, sound and color in “Floating Weeds”, Ozu articulates the inter-relationships of characters and the drama of daily life.
Unlike contemporary cinema, the subject of “Floating Weeds” is not dramatized cliches, but a series of everyday events. These events are constituted by the familiar struggles of growing up, finding employment, and fighting with family all the while set amongst middle class homes, bars, and even brothels. Ozu’s scenes mirror the rhythms of ordinary life. Indeed, even activity within the frame is restrained. Each shot is a single vignette rather than a montage: a group at dinner, a man and son fishing, a young couple kissing or a seaside portrait. The characters engage in seemingly mundane dialogue as they go through the motions of daily life. Indeed, at some points, the film borders on boring. As a result, “Floating Weeds” succeeds in emphasizing the intimate moment and the significant gesture. Rather than focus on the story as a whole, Ozu captures the intimate instances between father and son, new lovers, old lovers, and even the members of the troupe. In doing so, he creates grand moments out of otherwise common place scenes.
Even within the film, the townspeople and troupe alike seem more interested in the intimate qualities of their peers rather than the dramatics. During the Kabuki showings, the townspeople quickly loose interest in the exaggerated theatrics of the actors and choose to throw objects at the stage instead. In fact, the theater struggles to maintain attendance and the show quickly fails. Likewise, the actors themselves appear un-eager to appear in their own garish and over-dramatized performances. Rather, like the viewers of the movie itself, they prefer to spend their time peeking through the curtains and into the audience and its intimacies.
Ozu's shots establish an intimacy between the audience and individual characters. In the opening sequence, the shots are primarily long shots of light houses, sea scapes, and town scapes. However, as the film evolves, so do the shots. The focus is drawn towards character relationships and their rapport. This is often captured while the actors are seated on tatami mats around dining room tables. These scenes are shot at a low angle- such that the viewer appears to be almost knee-level with the actors. Moreover, the camera hovers in this position for minutes on end. These shots both frame the environment while establishing an intimacy among the spectator and characters. From our position beyond the ‘screen’, we are allowed to contemplate and eventually inhabit their action. In addition, by placing the viewer lower than the actors, the shots lends a sense of stature and grandiose to the otherwise ‘ordinary’ characters. In fact, Ozu’s shots literally and figuratively never look down on the characters.
The camera movement further examines the intimacy among characters. Rather than pan across rooms or follow actors as they cross the screen, the position of the camera is invariable. Indeed, it remains fixed on scenes for extended periods without moving. For example, before Kyoshi’s first romantic encounter with Kayo, Komajura’s son is pictured arriving at the theater. Even though he paces back and forth before finally entering the theater, the camera does not follow him. Instead, it remains un-moving, choosing instead to frame the the theater door. In doing so, Ozu prompts the spectator to contemplate Kyoshi’s action instead of simply reacting. Rather then “calling attention to persons an pairs of persons and objects…” this medium “[does] not call attention to them but… lets its part draw attention to themselves according to their natural weight.” (Cavell 4). Indeed, as a result of the stillness, the spectator becomes attent to Kyoshi’s heavy footsteps and anxious breaths. This reveals his simultaneous anticipation and nervousness at meeting Kayo and allows the observer to penetrate the privacies of their budding relationship.
Transitions are instrumental in focusing attention on individuals rather than the plot as a whole. Throughout the film, Ozu does not employ an dissolves. Instead, he cuts between one composition and the next. This style is contrary to the classical convention of montage. By removing the ‘in-betweens’ (with the exception of “pillow shots”), Ozu establishes a world in which every image and detail counts. By breaking up each unique moment, the observer is forced to analyze what is actually going on within the shot rather than the film as a whole. Ozu’s intentness conditions our own perspective- allowing us to become hyper aware of the nuances within the character’s relationships and their behavior with each other. Following Kiyoshi and Kayo’s nighttime soiree, the film cuts to an image on the beach leaving huge plot gaps to fill. Through this transition, the spectator is compelled to wonder what is so crucial about the beach that it is worth cutting away too? Only in doing so can we understand the despair that consumes the actors as they realize that they are stranded and quite literally ‘sunk in the sand’. “Floating Weeds” appears less concerned with the logic of the plot then with the essential authenticity of each moment on screen.
Color an light are evoked to subtly reveals the evolution of emotion. During the film, a character soberly observes “ Nothing is constant under he sun”. Indeed, even the sun itself does not appear constant in “Floating Weeds”. Throughout the film there is a distinct visual progression from day to night. At the beginning of the movie, the scenes are bathed in sunlight and the spirits of the troupe are high. The second half, however, takes place primarily at night. This emphasizes not only the darker aspects of the story but the grieve of the characters themselves as they come to terms with the future of the theater group and their relationships with each other. This emotional and psychological shift is captured by the colors which, with the exception of red, become progressively dulled. However, even when the colors are vibrant, the cinematography remains distinctively contemplative.
Ozu stylizes sound to develop the relationships between characters. The entire film is marked by an absence of background noise. Despite taking place in a seaside town, the familiar sound of seagulls or the crashing of waves is largely absent. Indeed, one of the few externalized sounds is the roar of an airplane as it passes over the beach. Otherwise, all sound emanates from the conversations among characters. As a result, the spectator is forced to focus on the content of their conversation and consequent development of their relationships. The soundtrack, in particular, focuses on a single relationship: that of Komajuro and his son. Throughout the film, the music alternates between a romantic style soundtrack and traditional theater music. While the former song type represents the youthful and in love Kiyoshi, the latter represents the older and more traditional Komajuro. The use of both song types represents a reckoning of Japanese tradition with modernity and its affect on the reconciliation of father and son.
“Floating Weeds” diverges from ‘traditional’ cinematography. While the action, shot, color and sound elements employed by “Floating Weeds” contradict contemporary “film grammar”, they accomplish what Ozu sought to do: create an intent focus on the relationships of characters. Rather than concern himself with the larger plot and its dramatics, Ozu focus on the day to day moments of his characters. His interest lies in the intimacies of life rather than its larger passions. Through a series of stylized shots and scenes, Ozu succeeds in forming a thorough landscape of relationships and emotion.